03.09.2010

Evaluation of Swedish anti-prostitution law: empty of evidence and methodology, but full of ideology

On July 15th 2010, Louise Persson and Laura Agustin published this article about the government’s report evaluating the law against buying sex published at the beginning of the month, a report so badly done that it proves nothing at all. They wrote about the embarrassing lack of evidence to prove the law has had any impact at all on the buying and selling of sex. This is not an ideological argument; it doesn’t prove that the law is no good; it proves that the evaluation is no good. Significant because the world’s peabrained media have picked up the claim – Swedish Law Giant Success – without reading even the English summary of points that make it crystal-clear that evaluators couldn’t find any evidence of anything.

Laura Agustin, who lives in Sweden, says that many Swedes don’t like the law, but, since the government treats it as a symbol of Swedishness, these voices are rarely heard in public forums. And few politicians have commented one way or another on the evaluation of the law, and only one government official claimed it proves the law is a success. Given that the report has been strongly criticised as empty of evidence and methodology but full of ideology in its very remit, debate has been curiously muted. Why?

State Feminist shaming keeps Swedish politicians quiet about sex-purchase law. One feminist faction promotes the ideology that prostitutes are always, by definition, victims of violence against women. This ideology predominates among Swedish State Feminists who claim that the existence of commercial sex is a key impediment to achieving gender equality. Such a dogma is odd, given the very small number of people engaged in selling sex in a welfare state that does not exclude them from its services and benefits.

Laura Agustin speaks about the Swedish State "Big Sister" Feminism:
In Sweden, theory calling itself radical feminism in the 1960s has moved in a direction Orwell might have called Big Sister Feminism, where no disagreement is brooked. This particular feminism happens to hold power in Swedish government bureaucracy. It is State Feminism, but there is no reason why State Feminism should have to be extremist; this is just how history has played out in Sweden. This view of women and men exists in every country I have lived in, and that is quite a few. And my, how many extremist feminists wish it would play out the same way in their countries!